Реферат: Olympic Games Essay Research Paper

have been raised, but they have not always been satisfactorily resolved by the

IOC, leading to confusion about the definition of professionalism in different

sports (White 79). By 1983 a majority of IOC members acknowledged that most

Olympic athletes compete professionally in the sense that sports are their main

activity. The IOC then asked each ISF to determine eligibility in its own sport,

and over the next decade nearly all the ISFs abolished the distinction between

amateurs and professionals, accepting so-called open Games. One of the most

visible examples of the policy change came in 1992, when professional players

from the National Basketball Association of the United States were permitted to

play in the Summer Games in Barcelona, Spain. The Olympic Games have always

included a number of ceremonies, many of which emphasize the themes of

international friendship and peaceful co-operation. The opening ceremony has

always included the parade of nations, in which the teams from each nation enter

the main stadium as part of a procession. The Greek team always enters first, to

"commemorate the ancient origins of the modern Games", and the team of

the host nation always enters last(Gary 25). The opening ceremony has evolved

over the years into a complex extravaganza, with music, speeches, and pageantry.

The torch relay, in which the Olympic Flame symbolizes the "transmission of

Olympic ideals from ancient Greece to the modern world and was introduced as

part of the opening ceremony at the 1936 Summer Games in Berlin"(Gary 26).

In the relay the torch is lit in Olympia, Greece, and is carried over several

weeks or months to the Host City by a series of runners. After the last runner

has lit the Olympic Cauldron in the main Olympic stadium, the host country’s

head of state declares the Games officially open, and doves are released to

symbolize the hope of world peace. Two other important ceremonial innovations

had appeared earlier at the 1920 Games in Antwerp, Belgium. The Olympic Flag,

with its five interlocking rings of different colors against a white background,

was flown for the first time. The five rings represent "unity among the

nations of Africa, the Americas, Asia, Australia, and Europe"(Gary 27).